Harvey Kubernik

Photo by Heather Harris

During 2019 Harvey Kubernik served as consultant on a new 2-part documentary Laurel Canyon: A Place In Time. Alison Ellwood is directing the documentary who helmed the authorized History of the Eagles. Executive produced by Frank Marshall, The Kennedy/Marshall Company; Darryl Frank and Justin Falvey (Steven Spielberg’s) Amblin Television; Craig Kallman and Mark Pinkus, Warner Music Group; Alex Gibney, Stacey Offman and Richard Perello, Jigsaw Productions; and Jeff Pollack. The film is produced by Ryan Suffern, The Kennedy/Marshall Company, and Erin Edeiken, Jigsaw Productions.

Laurel Canyon: A Place In Time debuted on Premium television network EPIX which was broadcast on Sunday, May 31st at 10 p.m., and concluded the following Sunday, June 7th at 10 p.m.

In summer of 2019, Harvey was a feature on-screen interview for director Matt O’Casey on his BBC4-TV digital arts channel Christine McVie, Fleetwood Mac’s Songbird. The cast includes Christine McVie, Stan Webb of Chicken Shack, Mick Fleetwood, Stevie Nicks, John McVie, Christine’s family members, Heart’s Nancy Wilson, Mike Campbell, Neil Finn, and producer Richard Dashut. Debut broadcast was on Friday September 20th.

In 2019 Harvey Kubernik appeared as an interview subject in the Chris Sibley & David Tourje-directed short documentary entitled John Van Hamersveld: Crazy World Ain’t It that had its World Premiere on February 6th 2019 at the Santa Barbara Film Festival. It’s headed to the Miami International Film Festival for the 2020 season and is a selection for the 2020 Toronto Documentary Short Film Festival in spring. View the trailer at https://vimeo.com/312221882. Van Hamersveld designed the iconic Endless Summer visual image and album covers for The Beatles, The Rolling Stones, Jefferson Airplane, Grateful Dead, the Beach Boys, and Blondie.

“Van Hamersveld is discussed by music historian Kubernik, artist Shepard Fairey, surfers Shaun Thompson and Jeff Ho, artist Louise Sandhous, designer Nina Palomba to name a few starring as themselves in the documentary, we get to hear their tales, their version of the hero worship. The seer-like calmness of Hamersveld to freeze the time in his frames regardless of their age and/or culture is awe-inspiring, to say the least!”—Indie Shorts Magazine.

Kubernik was a talking head in director Matthew O’Casey’s 2012 Queen at 40 documentary broadcast on BBC Television and released as a DVD Queen: Days Of Our Lives in 2014 via Eagle Rock Entertainment.

Harvey Kubernik was also spotlighted for the 2013 BBC-TV documentary on Bobby Womack Across 110th Street, directed by James Meycock. Womack, Ronnie Wood of the Rolling Stones, Damon Albarn of Blur and the Gorillaz as well as actor Antonio Vargas are featured. https://nwfilm.org › United Kingdom.

In 2019 The National Recording Registry at the Library of Congress displayed Kubernik’s multi-voice essay on the landmark The Band, now celebrating a 50th anniversary edition.

In November of 2006, Harvey Kubernik was a featured speaker discussing audiotape preservation and archiving at special hearings called by The Library of Congress in Washington, D.C. that were held in Hollywood, California.

In July of 2017, Harvey Kubernik appeared at the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in Cleveland, Ohio as part of their distinguished Author Series discussing his 1967 A Complete Rock History of the Summer of Love published by Sterling/Barnes and Noble. Kubernik lectured and participated in a Q. and A. session with the venue’s curator and audience.

In July 2017, Sterling/Barnes and Noble Publishing inked a book agreement with Harvey and Kenneth Kubernik to write and assemble The Story of the Band From Big Pink to The Last Waltz which chronicles their influential musical career from 1966-1976. Book was published in November 2018 and enjoying critical acclaim.

Harvey Kubernik in May 2019 signed a book deal with Sterling/Barnes and Noble for a hard cover illustrated text on Jimi Hendrix, slated for a 2021 publication.

Kubernik was a contributor to Hendrix: The Illustrated Story by Gillian G. Gaar with Dave Hunter, Chris Salewicz and Jaan Uhelszki (with other sources), published in 2017 by Voyageur Press. Harvey, who witnessed the Jimi Hendrix Experience live in 1969 at the Newport ’69 pop festival in Southern California, was interviewed for The BBC World Wide Radio Service on their News Hour program during a September 19, 2005 segment discussing the musical legacy of Jimi Hendrix acknowledging the 35th anniversary of the musicians passing in 1970.

On September 21, 2014, Palazzo Editions published the heralded Leonard Cohen: Everybody Knows, a coffee-table-size volume with narrative and oral history written by Harvey Kubernik. Currently published in six foreign languages, in spring 2016, the title was published in China and Russia.

In 2019 Harvey Kubernik was interviewed by best-selling author and biographer Michael Posner for Leonard Cohen, Untold Stories: The Early Years that Simon & Schuster will publish in hardcover on October 6, 2020. It’s the first of three Cohen volumes Posner is doing for the company. Posner is a former managing editor of the Financial Times of Canada and spent sixteen years as senior writer with The Globe and Mail. Read about Cohen and Kubernik literary and musical endeavors archived on the official forum of Leonardcohenfiles.com and cohencentric.com.

Palazzo Editions arranged Kubernik’s music and recording study illustrated history book, Neil Young, Heart of Gold was published in November, 2015, by Hal Leonard (US), Omnibus Press (UK), Monte Publishing (Canada) and Hardie Grant (Australia), that coincided with Young’s 70th birthday. A German edition was also published for May, 2016.

Inside Cave Hollywood: The Harvey Kubernik InterViews, Vol. 1 was published by Cave Hollywood Books. The compilation of interviews, essays and multi-voice narratives are culled from content on cavehollywood.com.

Harvey Kubernik’s first book, This Is Rebel Music was published in 2002, and Hollywood Shack Job: Rock Music In Film and on Your Screen in 2004 also published by the University of New Mexico Press.

Harvey is also a contributing writer of That Lucky Old Sun, a Genesis Publications limited- edition (2009) title (signed), done in collaboration with Brian Wilson of the Beach Boys and Sir Peter Blake, designer of the Beatles’ Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band album sleeve.

Harvey and Kenneth co-authored the highly regarded A Perfect Haze: The Illustrated History of the Monterey International Pop Festival, published in 2011 by Santa Monica Press.

Harvey Kubernik and Kenneth Kubernik also wrote the text and biographical portrait for legendary photographer Guy Webster’s first book of music, movie and television photos for Insight Editions; Big Shots: Rock Legends & Hollywood Icons: Through the lens of Guy Webster, published October 21, 2014, with an Introduction by Brian Wilson.

In April 2015, Big Shots won the Benjamin Franklin Gold Medal award in Art & Photography from the Independent Book Publishing Association. In May 2015, the book garnered the Independent Publisher Award Bronze Medal in the category of Photography.

In March, 2014, Harvey Kubernik’s It Was 50 Years Ago Today THE BEATLES Invade America and Hollywood was published by Otherworld Cottage Industries. Kubernik also penned the introduction to Otherworld Cottage Industries’ Travis Edward Pike’s Odd Tales and Wonders: 1964-1974 A Decade of Performance, published by BookBaby, 1st Edition, 6th November 2015.

During February 2018, Otherworld Cottage Industries published Harvey Kubernik’s multi-voice narrative book The Doors Summer’s Gone. In March 2019 the title was nominated for the 2019 Association for Recorded Sound Collections Awards for Excellence in Historical Recorded Sound Research.

In 2020 Kubernik inked a book deal with Otherworld Cottage Industries for a second volume study of rock music documentaries and pop culture movies for July 2020 publication.

This new collection follows his 2004 Hollywood Shack Job: Rock Music In Film and on Your Screen. During 1976-2019 Kubernik interviewed legendary filmmakers and Academy Award winners D.A. Pennebaker, Murray Lerner, Albert Maysles, Morgan Neville, John Ridley, and Michael Lindsay-Hogg as well as Dick Clark, Colin Hanks, Allan Arkush, Curtis Hanson, Heather Harris, Bob Sarles, David Leaf, Andrew Solt, Paul Justman, Heather Harris, Christopher Allport, Sandra Warren, John Anderson, Leslie Ann Coles, Seymour Cassel, and Robbie Robertson. Kubernik’s essays on The T.A.M. I. Show, The Big TNT Show, along with tributes penned about Jack Good of Shindig!, deejay/TV host Casey Kasem and Don Webster of Upbeat are included.

Kubernik’s writings are in several book anthologies, most notably The Rolling Stone Book of the Beats and Drinking with Bukowski. He was the project coordinator of the recording set The Jack Kerouac Collection.

Kubernik’s 1995 interview, Berry Gordy: A Conversation With Mr. Motown, initially published in HITS, Goldmine and BAM magazines was licensed for The Pop, Rock & Soul Reader edited by David Brackett published in 2019 by Oxford University Press.

Brackett is a Professor of Musicology in the Schulich School of Music at McGill University in Canada. Kubernik joined a lineup with LeRoi Jones, Johnny Otis, Ellen Willis, Nat Hentoff, Jerry Wexler, Jim Delehant, Ralph J. Gleason, Cameron Crowe and Robert Hilburn.

This century Kubernik penned the liner notes to the CD re-releases of Carole King’s Tapestry, Allen Ginsberg’s Kaddish, the Elvis Presley ’68 Comeback Special and The Ramones’ End of the Century.

Harvey is featured in the 2014 book by Jeff Burger on Leonard Cohen Interviews and Encounters for Chicago Review Press and in 2015 the University Press of Mississippi published a Harvey Kubernik interview with D.A. Pennebaker in their book series, Conversations with Filmmakers, edited by Dr. Keith Beattie.

In November 2019, Harvey Kubernik’s 1996 music and recording-themed interview with poet/author Allen Ginsberg was published in Conversations With Allen Ginsberg, edited by David Stephen Calonne for the University Press of Mississippi in their Literary Conversations Series.

Monkees’ archivist/scholar, Gary Strobl, along with Harvey and Kenneth Kubernik have co-written a 496-page hard cover study of the Monkees to be published by Omnibus Press during the first quarter of 2021. The volume features the photographs of Henry Diltz.

Los Angeles-based Grammy Museum guest curator Harvey Kubernik, along with Henry Diltz and Gary Strobl developed the California Dreamin’: The Sounds of Laurel Canyon, 1965-1977 exhibition that ran May 9th to November 30th, 2014, looking at the Laurel Canyon music scene of the late ‘60s. Harvey, Micky Dolenz of The Monkees, Gail Zappa, and Danny Hutton, founding member of Three Dog Night chaired a panel discussion on the region.

Kubernik and archivist Gary Strobl teamed with ABC-TV in 2013 for their Emmy-winning one hour Eye on L.A. Legends of Laurel Canyon program hosted by Tina Malave.

In 2014 Harvey Kubernik and author Jan Alan Henderson were feature interviews for London, England-based BBC Radio 4 and their radio documentary California Dreaming, Laurel Canyon, produced by Andy Parfitt, which chronicled the California music scene of the late 1960s and early 1970.

Harvey Kubernik, his Canyon of Dreams book, along with Lenny Waronker, Gary Burden, and Dwight Yoakam discussed the legacy of Laurel Canyon in 2015 on the David Dye-hosted NPR radio program World Café.

Harvey Kubernik was formerly the host and co-producer of the 50/50 television interview series that was first broadcast in 1977 continued into 1980 on Public Access cable, Manhattan Cable and the landmark pay service Z Channel. Jerry Harvey the chief programmer at Z Channel premiered director’s cuts and “lost films,” including Sergio Leone’s Once Upon a Time in America, and Sam Peckinpah’s Pat Garrett & Billy the Kid.

Kubernik’s guests on 50/50 were Todd Rundgren, deejay Murray the K, author Danny Sugerman, and record producer Michael Lloyd. Film clips of Aretha Franklin, Otis Redding, the Doors and Pink Lady were screened. Reporter Cynthia Kirk in a 1978 Daily Variety review praised 50/50: “On a par with The Midnight Special.”

As a teenager in the late sixties, Harvey Kubernik danced for a season on American Bandstand, hosted by Dick Clark, and also appeared on Shebang, hosted by Casey Kasem, two of the most popular national music television programs of their day.

In the June 21, 2014 issue of The Hollywood Reporter, Kubernik penned a tribute to Kasem. Remembering Casey Kasem: Regional Hero, National Treasure.

In May 2014, filmmaker Matt O’Casey lensed Kubernik in his BBC-TV documentary on singer Meat Loaf, titled Meat Loaf; In and Out of Hell, broadcast in the U.S. market in 2016 on the Showtime Cable TV channel.

In the 2016 Neil Norman–directed documentary, The Seeds: Pushin’ Too Hard, Kubernik appeared in an on-screen feature interview, along with the Beach Boys’ Bruce Johnston, Iggy Pop, Kim Fowley, the Bangles and Johnny Echols of Love. In June 2019 it had a sold out screening in London.

Kubernik has done stage lectures and movie analysis at the University of Southern California School of Cinema-Television, about filmmaker and pioneer cinema verité director and Oscar-winner D. A. Pennebaker examining his Bob Dylan Don’t Look Back (1965), and David Bowie Ziggy and the Spiders From Mars (1973), documentaries for instructor Dr. David James.

This decade Harvey was filmed for the in-progress music documentary about the former Hollywood landmark Gold Star Recording Studio and co-owner/engineer Stan Ross directed by Jonathan Rosenberg. Brian Wilson, Herb Alpert, Richie Furay, Darlene Love, Mike Curb, Chris Montez, Nino Tempo, Bill Medley, Don Randi, Hal Blaine, Don Peake, Carol Kaye, Marky Ramone, Artie Butler, David Kessel and Steven Van Zandt were among those participating.

During summer 2019 Kubernik advised the Gold Star-inspired musical stage show, 33 1/3-House of Dreams, written by Rosenberg and Brad Ross, the son of Stan Ross. The play had a World Premiere at the San Diego Repertory Theatre in their Lyceum Stage Theater in San Diego and ran August 1st and going to August 25 2019. It broke attendance records in the 44 year history of the venue. In 2020 the play’s Blake McCarty received an Outstanding Projection Design Award from the San Diego Theater Critics Circle Awards.

During 2007, Kubernik appeared on screen in the deluxe edition 40th anniversary DVD of Jailhouse Rock which starred Elvis Presley. He comments on the making of the infamous “Jailhouse Rock” musical number from the M-G-M Presley movie.

In 2014, Kubernik was a consultant and interview subject for an hour-long examination of the musical legacy of Los Angeles for the Australia television series Great Music Cities for Australian subscription television broadcaster XYZnetworks Pty Ltd (www.xyznetworks.com.au). Slash, Brian Wilson, Steve Lukather and Keith Richards were also lensed for the project. Senior Producer is Wade Goring for Australian music television channel MAX www.maxtv.com.au.

In April 2014, Harvey Kubernik’s book, Turn Up the Radio! Rock, Pop and Roll in Los Angeles 1956-1972, was published by Santa Monica Press and garnered global praise.

“Music journalist Kubernik (A Perfect Haze) takes readers on a nostalgic tour of the L.A. music scene at a pivotal period in pop music history. Compiling over 200 interviews (both original and borrowed) with musicians and behind-the-scenes personnel, Kubernik constructs the narrative as an oral history, sewing together anecdotal snippets by radio DJs like Art Laboe, songwriters like Mike Stoller, Jerry Leiber, and Lou Adler, and producers like Phil Spector. There are behind the scene tales of up and coming artists at work, who went on to become icons, such as Elvis Presley, The Beach Boys, Sonny and Cher, The Rolling Stones, Tina Turner, and more, including lesser known but highly respected players like singer Betty Jane Baker. Illustrated with candid photos, concert posters, newspaper clippings, ticket stubs, the book projects the enthusiasm of a personal scrapbook. Less of an authoritative history in scope, Kubernik hones the creative energy of the era and successfully presents the era’s atmosphere—an era where music transcended race, the summer of love and iconic festivals were in full swing, and music pioneers on the stage or behind the radio and labels were facing the ups and downs of the business. Color Photos.”—Publishers Weekly

“Music journalist Kubernik, building upon his excellent Canyon of Dreams (2012), captures the excitement of rock in Los Angeles from its inception to the early 1970s. Using more than 200 interviews, some previously published, which he conducted over the past 38 years, he pieces together an intriguing oral history of the musicians, songwriters, managers, producers, and DJs who dominated and shaped the L.A. scene….A lavishly illustrated and comprehensive view of rock and roll in Los Angeles by the people who created it that will interest all types of readers.”—Library Journal

“A golden-age coffee table book, and memorable for all sorts of left-field comment.”—Greil Marcus.

“Turn Up the Radio! takes a trip back in time to the roots of rock in Los Angeles. Veteran music journalist and local native Harvey Kubernik’s coffee table tome is a treasure trove of vintage pics and historical anecdotes.”—Hollywood Reporter

“A massive, and massively cool collection of L.A. rock ephemera and recollections from classic acts of the 50s-70s, with an emphasis on the importance of local radio in the development of the groundbreaking music of that era. It’s one of those books where, right when you think every rare photo and nutty story has been unearthed, you open it and are blown away. Especially noteworthy are the loads of backstage and studio images. The book itself is doorstop big and heart-stop packed.”—College Media Journal.

“The Doors, The Beach Boys, Phil Spector and The Monkees helped establish L.A. as America’s rock and roll capitol. Harvey Kubernik’s book Turn Up the Radio! doesn’t just look at the songs and the front men, but the talent throughout the recording and radio industries that created and promoted this enduring era of music. Drawn from over 200 interviews blending music industry figures with the radio personalities that brought this music to the public and adding first-rate photography makes this coffee-table-sized book a comprehensive chronicle of the center of the American rock and roll universe.”—Hot Wax Daily, Premiere Radio Network

“This fine tribute to the musicians, DJs, movers and shakers who filled the Hills and Canyons with rock’n’roll noise between 1956 and 1972 is a fine addition to the West Coast canon. Containing stacks of rare and unpublished photographs and memorabilia, Turn Up The Radio! justifies the screamer, as it brings characters such as Dave Diamond, Art Laboe and The Real Don Steele to life just as they’re about to unleash new sounds on an unsuspecting audience. Kubernik’s knowledge of the scene is vast and he shares it with a generous passion and vivid eye for detail as his snapshots cajole Frank Zappa, The Doors and The Byrds – to name but three of the thousands cavorting inside these pages – into focus, providing an embellished oral history en route. There are also memorable recollections of The Beach Boys, with Brian Wilson “surfacing like a great white whale from some unfathomable depth” as he rejoins the group at Long Beach Arena in 1971. Because he hung out and dug the scene, Kubernik makes you feel like you’re sharing a hot dog with The Monkees or waving at Jack Nitzsche outside RCA Studios. Brilliant. 5 stars.”—Record Collector magazine

“Once again, music historian Kubernik puts an intense focus on his hometown’s contribution to rock history, resulting in an attractive cloth-bound book that spotlights the city’s radio DJs, producers, engineers and musicians, both famous and obscure. The book is a revelatory anecdote-filled ride.”—Music Connection

Kubernik received a Special Thanks screen credit in filmmaker David Leaf’s September 2006 theatrical release, The U.S. vs. John Lennon (Lionsgate Films / Paramount Pictures). He also has a Special Thanks credit on A&E documentary on The Bee Gees’, This Is Where I Came In, written and directed by Leaf that aired December 10, 2000. An expanded version for home video was released in April 2001. Thank you credit on TNT’s An All-Star Salute to Brian Wilson that aired July 4, 2001, on the cable network.

Kubernik has appeared in Martin Scorsese-directed movies, The Last Waltz and New York, New York. Kubernik’s office provided on-camera talent for E! TV’s True Hollywood Stories documentary episodes, The History of The Sunset Strip (May 1999) and Sonny Bono (June 1999), the PBS (KCET) television program Life & Times, MTV/I.R.S. Records’ The Cutting Edge, and the late night ABC-TV show, Goodnight L.A.

In fall 1997, Kubernik received screen credit acknowledgement in the Berlin (Germany) TV show Pop Odyssey (Turner-Taylor Productions). Harvey Kubernik and the KubRo Group also received a thank you screen credit for helping prepare the VH1 show, Behind the Music for the year 1992, produced by Mark Rowland, and VH1’s Behind The Music profile of DJ/Rock ’n’ Roll pioneer Alan Freed that aired in March 2000 on the music network. Also received a thank you acknowledgment in the VH1 Behind the Music production on The Bangles.

Kubernik contributed talent to Rhino Home Video’s Classic Albums series, arranging the Jim Keltner interview for the segment on The Band,” aired earlier on VH1, and he also had a cameo appearance with Elvis Costello in the concert film utilized to open concerts on Brian Wilson’s Summer 1999 Solo U.S./Japan Tour and conducted portions of the Elvis Costello interview that was used in the Beach Boys’ March 2000 video/DVD documentary, Endless Harmony (Delilah Films/Brother-Capitol Records).

Special Thanks credit on A&E documentary on The Bee Gees’, This Is Where I Came In, written and directed by David Leaf and aired December 10, 2000. An expanded version for home video was released in April 2001. Thank you credit on TNT’s An All-Star Salute to Brian Wilson that aired July 4, 2001, on the cable network.

In 2002, Kubernik contributed a chapter to Andrew Loog Oldham’s second book, 2Stoned, published by Random House in 2002. He provided text and research for Ben Edmonds’ recent book on Marvin Gaye and the making of the What’s Going On album (MOJO Books), and was interviewed by Ben Edmonds and thanked in the liner note credits of the expanded edition of the classic album, Forever Changes by the group Love (Rhino Records, Feb. 2001).

He has been interviewed and has conducted research and oral histories that were integrated in Barney Hoskyns’ recent book on Arthur Lee & Love, MOJO Heroes: Arthur Lee, published in the U.K. by MOJO Books in late 2001, and was interviewed and provided research for Sylvie Simmons’ 2001 book on Neil Young for MOJO Books.

Kubernik was interviewed this century at length by author Barney Hoskyns for his book, Mellow Gold: Songs, Drugs & Denim in the L.A. Canyons, published by Fourth Estate/Harper Collins. Kubernik also arranged a dozen other interviews for the project. In addition, he was interviewed for Jeff Apter’s biography on the Red Hot Chili Peppers Omnibus Press in the U.K

While a student at San Diego State University in the 1970s, under the direction of Dr. James L. Wheeler in the school’s Literature Department, Harvey Kubernik created and developed the first History of Rock Music class, the first-ever accredited course in regular curriculum upper division academia. The catalogues of Bob Dylan and Jim Morrison were studied for a semester.

Kubernik has also lectured and conducted classroom courses on the music business, music and spoken-word record production and music journalism at universities such as UCLA and the University of Southern California.

Kubernik has joined the U.K.-based archive website “Rock’s Back Pages” (www.rocksbackpages.com), billed as “an indispensable on-line library of rock writing using content from the best music writers of the past 30 years.” A dozen catalogue pieces are available from this online house.

From 1975-1980 Harvey was an occasional food runner and provided percussion and handclapped on a handful of Phil Spector-produced recording sessions at Gold Star. He has album credits on the Ramones’ End Of The Century and The Paley Brothers’ Baby, Let’s Stick Together. He also was on dates for Leonard Cohen’s Death of a Ladies’ Man.

Harvey Kubernik, a native of Los Angeles, was born on February 26, 1951 at Queen of Angels Hospital in Echo Park, overlooking the Hollywood 101 Freeway. Harvey attended Coliseum Street Elementary School in downtown Los Angeles and Muirfield Elementary Schools in the Crenshaw Village area and then El Marino Elementary School in Culver City.

Kubernik is a graduate of Fairfax High School and West Los Angeles College, where he earned an A.A. Degree. Kubernik holds a B.A. Special Major Degree (Health, Sociology, Literature) from San Diego State University 1973.